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  Bangkok, Thailand
Monday, December 8, 2008

Monday

We early, very early, at 5 the mosque beside us began playing their call to prayer. It stopped shortly and we went back to sleep only to wake up again just after 6 when the loud speakers came on again with the singing or chanting. It continued on. There is another wing to our guest house (we are on the 5th or top floor) and it is where the younger packers are. Their rooms have fans, so I imagine their windows are wide open and can hear the speakers even clearer. One chap vocally expresses his dislike, enough already, and etc. We put the t.v. on and watch the news and finally give up and get out of bed. The praying is still going on.

Off for breakfast and you know where we are going, back to that corner for toast and sweet milk. Only when we get there the cart isn't there, there aren't any vendors today. We find out afterwards it is a festival day so we settle on a café breakfast.

Off to the river and we catch a boat back to the Royal Palace, today we have long pants on so we are o.k. and don't have to borrow any clothes.

We first tour the museum of Royal Memorabilia, Clothes and Coins. Oh, my, lots of gold bowls, spittoons, pots, jewelry, swords, most are all gold with precious stones in them. They have displays of items used in their coronation ceremony, the cradle ceremony and when the prince/princesses get their first hair cut at age 11 or 12. Lots of coins from the past to the current date. Also the clothes for the Buddha, as the season changes the King will change the clothes on the Emerald Buddha in the Royal Monastery. There are 3 seasons here, spring, rainy and winter. The Buddha has the rainy and winter gold covering on now. It was interesting, but most things were not dated so we did not know how old the items were..

Next onto the Royal Monastery of the Emerald Buddha. This is a maze of beautiful buildings, I am sure the pictures will not give a true idea of how many buildings, how beautiful they are with the glass mosaics on the outside. As each king came along he added another building to the area. The green Buddha is about 2-3 feet tall and was originally covered with a plaster. In 1434 a monk noticed it's nose was green and that was when they realized it was made of jade. It is not know how old it is or where it originally came from. It is adorned on a very high alter with a lot of gold Buddhas' and ornaments around it. Sorry no pictures inside. We then went into the Royal Palace grounds, the coronation hall with the beautiful ornate chair, the King's gun collection museum and the weapons museum, watched the changing of the guards and lastly visited another reception hall whose ceiling is about 20 feet high with stenciled pictures evenly painted on the walls. At first I thought it was wallpaper because all the little pictures were even both vertically, diagonally and horizontally. Artists were renovating the bas-relief paintings that went all around the circumference of the temple area, meticulously by hand with fine brushes and also redoing the gold filigree figures.

Our tour completed we looked for a place to eat as my watch timer went off reminding us it was time for the malaria pills. We tried a bbq meat on a stick, but quite fatty inside so we went on to find a boat to the shopping mall area first by tuk-tuk and then on a boat up a canal. Before we caught the boat we went looking for a place to eat, only street vendors, but we found a corn man! I finally get to have one! We were usually at a restaurant eating when the corn man went by in Mui Ne beach. I waited my turn as it is lunch hour and the workers in the offices are also waiting for corn or peanuts or another red bean/nut we didn't recognize. He cut the corn off the cob and put it in a bag with a long stick to eat with. They usually put sugar on their corn, I got a bit of salt on mine and we shared it. It was very sweet and hot, and we enjoyed it. Nothing down the street so we go back to where we catch the boat and go into 7-11 for lunch. Len has a hot dog and I get a yogurt. The hot dog is good so we both have one. We then go to the boat area and it is ready to go. This is the beginning of the line. The boat is long with benches running across it. It has a roof and on the sides are blue and white tarps with ropes running through a pulley to pull the sides up to prevent water coming in from passing boats or with the wind. The driver sits in the middle up front and there are two money takers who walk along the side holding onto ropes and collect the fees. They also hop off and tie the boat while people climb on and off. We went under several bridges, some were low ones and the roof, held up with pipes, slides forward and down to fit underneath. Quite the experience. We get off 4 stops down and got up to the street. We are now in the wholesale area. Lots of shops and market areas. I am sure I could get great deals buying in bulk here! We are off to the computer store to look for that elusive cheap computer. There are 5 floors to the building. Lots of stores with music, movie, games, t.v. series all on CD's . With the number of outlets and the prices so low we know they are pirated or copies. There are so many salesmen, it is almost like the Mexicans in Vegas who flick the cards and give them to the men to entice them to come and see girlie shows. And all those crinkly woman's tops being sold in Mexico and at the flea markets in Yuma or Weslaco, they are all here. So, are they made in Mexico or Thailand??? Good question. We did find that elusive little computer for a good price, and when we leave we can claim the taxes back at the airport. I guess it was a slow day, we did get a discount from the asking price, and they included a plug in mouse, 2gb memory stick, and head set. We went with the salesman to a computer repair shop and had windows and word put on the little guy.

Back to the boat area and another interesting ride home as it is just about rush hour, the boat was quite full. We walked from the boat back to the hotel, not too far and we got to see more sights on the street. Some of the buildings have ornate decorations on top. It was originally a street for parades with the Kings house at one end and palace at the other end by the river. It used to have mahogany trees lining each side of the street until they began building government offices along the street. Using the map Len got us home, we turned up Khoa San Road and had a fresh sweet mango cut for us to eat as we walked along.

No free wi-fi in the hotel, but we can work in the room and save on a memory stick and then go to an internet café and just download to travelpod. After diner we came back to the room and Len explored the computer. We watched the last episode of the Amazing Race. It has been in English, but tonight we got Thai voices over the English so missed some of the excitement of it all.

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